Between the lines

When it started, it was not a beginning. It was picking up the pieces that someone else had left behind. It was a start but not a beginning. It is very important that you understand that properly, that is why I am starting by telling you this.

There it was, a trail left behind from before. The pieces in no particular order. They were not even pieces, they were crumbs. There was no way of putting them back together. Then why did I bother to trace them and collect them? What would I do with them?

I didn’t know.

And because I didn’t know, something told me that I should pick them up and keep them away. For the future. To read something into the past. To make everything come together. To take this shattered start into a beginning. A beginning that was about to begin but could not because it was not meant to be. Not today. Not now.

In the middle of this celestial complication of starting and beginning, was what I was looking for. Neatly placed between the crumbs.

It was a space.

But as the crumbs were cleared away the space was no longer the space that was the beginning. And within that space lay the answer. It was all in the shape. The shape that defined the shape of things to come. And that was lost forever. All because something told me that I should pick up the crumbs and keep them away. For the future. To read something into the past. But it was all there.

And now it was not. It was gone. And that was the end of another beginning.